Members of the Fairbury City Council talked trash carts and appointed a new city clerk during Wednesday’s regular meeting at City Hall.
The council voted to lower the fee for a smaller size 35-gallon trash cart to $1.50. This is down from the initial charge of $3.50. Even though a number of residents were interested in the carts, there are only seven out currently while the city is sitting on 93 of them.
“If we cut (the price) in half, we might pick up some other people,” said Alderman Jerry Hoffman.
Alderman James Tipton said a resident called him a number of times with concerns over the price. Tipton made the motion to lower the fee.
Also at Wednesday’s meeting, the mayor’s appointment of Alexandria Reis as the new City Clerk was unanimously approved. The council had appointed Dale Diller as Clerk Pro Tem last month following the departure of former clerk Nancy Widlacki in early October.
An estimate from Layne Christensen Company for work on well #3 at the water plant was approved. Water Superintendent Mike Mellott indicated the well is not pumping like it should and the well must be inspected with a camera. The well has not had rehabilitation work since the mid-1990s. This estimate is simply to look at what needs to be done to the well.
Police Chief Robert McCormick was given approval for future expenditures not to exceed $15,000 to outfit a new squad vehicle. This would be for removal of equipment from the current squad and installation in the new one.
“What’s an estimate?” asked Alderman Bill Schmidgall.
McCormick believes it could be $15,000 on the high end.
Resident Rodney Chamness spoke to the council during public comment with concerns about speeders, asking if anything can be done about the speed limit coming into town from the west side on U.S. Route 24.
“That’s too fast through there,” he said.
Mayor David Slagel explained the city petitioned the state to have it lowered years ago when Dollar General moved out there but the state denied it after doing a survey.
“The east end of town when you come in, it’s 30 (miles per hour) right at CVS,” added Chamness.
Slagel said the city can look into it.
Wayne Varner also addressed the council, saying fines need to be updated so it is worth the police department’s time to issue tickets. Varner said he watched a farmer hauling in grain swerving around cars when traveling down the street.
City ESDA director Deb Moran reminded the council of the upcoming disaster drill on Monday, Nov. 7 at the new race building on the fairgrounds starting at 5:30 p.m.
Sewer Superintendent Brad Duncan reported engineers from Galesburg, Taylorville and a community in Minnesota looked at what Fairbury has done at the sewer plant as they want to do similar work in their communities.
Chief McCormick informed the council of new graphics on the police department office window courtesy of the Randall Meister Memorial Fund.
